ITW asked OttawaWatch columnist Lloyd Mackey to choose six Ottawa-based politicians who, since he began covering ‘The Hill’ 10 years ago, have approached politics with a Christian faith perspective. Mackey notes: “Often their constructive faith/political interfacing activities are distorted by the parry and thrust of adversarial politics. This is an opportunity place them together on the same (fellow)ship.” Mackey adds: “Many other Canadian politicians could be similarly profiled.”

Mark Warawa is Conservative mem-ber of parliament for Langley, B.C. and parliamentary secretary to Environment Minister John Baird. He is a graduate of Trinity Western University and, for 14 years until 2004, was a city councillor in Abbotsford. He and his wife Diane, and their five children, attend North Langley Community Church, a Mennonite Brethren congregation. That background has been of considerable value in influencing environment policy, since he was first elected to the Commons in 2004.

Diane Ablonczy is one of the most politically-experienced members of the present cabinet. A founder of the Reform Party, she has played a significant reconciling role in the present Conservative party. She and husband Don Sauer attend Centre Street Church, a Calgary mega-congregation. Ablonczy is seen as one of the people who, in addition to Preston Manning and the late C. S. Lewis, has provided some spiritual influence to Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

Bill Blaikie is a United Church minister who represents a Winnipeg riding for the NDP. He articulates a perspective he describes as the “Christian left,” in the tradition of Tommy Douglas, a Baptist minister who became the first leader of the federal NDP. Having served for almost 30 years, Blaikie was named Parliamentarian of the Year by his peers in a  Maclean’s poll last year. He will leave at the next election to teach on the relationship of faith and politics at the University of Winnipeg.

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Paul Steckle, a Liberal who has served Huron-Bruce riding in southwest Ontario since 1993, also plans to leave the House at the next election. A devout Mennonite, he has served, at various times, as chair of both the Parliamentary Prayer Breakfast and co-chair of the Parliamentary Pro-Life Caucus, both multi-party bodies. Greg McClinchey, a Steckle political aide, has recently penned a profile on him, entitled Stickin’ to His Guns.

Paul Zed is the last name on any parliamentary alphabetical list. His four children are baptized Catholics, who were also dedicated to God in Wesleyan church ceremonies. The pro-life Liberal MP for Saint John, New Brunswick spoke at length some years ago of the strong family Roman Catholic and Wesleyan links which had helped shape him spiritually.  For whatever reason, his marriage dissolved not long after that interview, but his convictions on these matters evidently remain intact.

Daniel Turp, a Bloc Quebecois MP during the 90s, is presently an MNA for the Parti Quebecois in Quebec City. His relatively conciliatory approach to Quebec separation can be traced, in part, to his spiritual pilgrimage. A nominal Catholic in his youth, he married Bartha Knoppers, the daughter of an Alberta Christian Reformed Church minister. They have been nurtured in their spiritual development, since marriage, at the Church of St. Andrew and St. Paul, a Presbyterian ‘cathedral’ in downtown Montreal.

Winter/Spring 2008